Seraphina's POV
The champagne glass slipped from my hand.
I didn't hear it shatter. I couldn't hear anything except Marcus's voice echoing through the ballroom: "Celestine Ashford, will you marry me?"
This wasn't happening. This couldn't be happening.
Marcus knelt on one knee in the center of the dance floor, holding a ring that sparkled under the chandelier lights. But he wasn't looking at me. He was looking at her. My half-sister. Celestine stood across from him in a dress the color of fresh blood, her hand covering her mouth in fake surprise.
"Say yes!" someone in the crowd shouted.
My feet moved on their own, carrying me forward. "Marcus?" My voice came out broken and small. "What are you doing?"
He finally looked at me. For two years, those brown eyes had looked at me with warmth. Now they were cold as winter stones.
"Seraphina," he said, not standing up, not moving toward me. "I'm sorry you had to find out this way."
Find out what? We had plans. Secret plans. He'd promised me just last week that tonight would be special, that everything would change. I'd thought he meant our engagement.
"But you said—" I started.
"He said what you needed to hear," my father's voice cut through the crowd like a knife. Duke Marcus Ashford stepped onto the dance floor, and the nobles parted for him like water. He looked at me the way he always did—like I was a stain on his expensive carpet. "Did you really think a merchant would want you, Seraphina? You, with no dowry, no title, and no prospects?"
The room went silent. Every eye turned to me.
My stepmother laughed, a tinkling sound that made my skin crawl. "Oh, Marcus played his part beautifully. Two years of pretending to care about the bastard daughter, keeping her happy and quiet while we arranged a real match."
The words hit me like punches. Pretending? Two years of pretending?
"No." I shook my head, looking at Marcus. "Tell them they're lying. Tell them what we meant to each other."
Marcus stood up slowly. He walked past me without touching me, without even looking at me, and took Celestine's hand. "I'm sorry, Seraphina. It was just business. Your father paid me well to keep you... occupied."
The nobles began to whisper. Then the whispers turned to laughter.
"Poor thing, she actually believed it!"
"Imagine thinking someone would choose her over Celestine."
"The bastard omega always was stupid."
My chest felt like it was caving in. Every secret kiss, every whispered promise, every time he'd held me and said I was special—all of it had been a lie. A paid performance.
"The jewelry," my stepmother announced loudly, gesturing to a servant who carried my mother's wooden box. "Seraphina's mother left her these trinkets. Since she obviously won't be needing them for a wedding, we're gifting them to Celestine. Consider it an early wedding present."
"No!" I lunged forward, but guards stepped in my way. "Those are mine! They're all I have left of her!"
My father grabbed my arm, his fingers digging in hard enough to bruise. "You have nothing," he hissed in my ear. "You are nothing. You're a mistake I've tolerated for twenty-three years. Be grateful I'm giving you a roof over your head."
He shoved me backward. I stumbled, and no one reached out to catch me. I hit the floor hard, my palms scraping against cold marble.
Above me, Celestine examined my mother's silver necklace, the one with the moon pendant. "Oh, this is lovely," she cooed, fastening it around her neck. "It suits me much better anyway."
Something inside me shattered worse than the champagne glass.
I pushed myself up, my legs shaking. Every face in the ballroom looked at me with pity or disgust or cruel amusement. These people had watched me grow up as the unwanted daughter. They'd watched me try so hard to earn love that was never coming.
And they'd known. All of them had known about Marcus.
"I hope you're happy," I whispered to my father. Then louder, to the whole room: "I hope you all choke on your happiness."
I ran.
Behind me, the laughter grew louder. I ran through the hallways of Ashford Manor, past the servants who turned away, past the portraits of family members I'd never be good enough to join. I ran to my tiny room in the servants' quarters—the room I'd lived in my whole life while Celestine got the princess chambers.
I slammed the door and collapsed against it, finally letting the sobs come.
A knock sounded three hours later. I'd cried myself dry by then.
"Go away," I croaked.
The door opened anyway. My father stood there, and he wasn't alone. Two guards flanked him.
"Get up," he commanded. "We need to discuss your future."
"I don't have a future," I said bitterly. "You made sure of that."
His smile was the cruelest thing I'd ever seen. "Oh, you have a future, daughter. In fact, you're getting married after all."
My heart stuttered. "What?"
"The Empire has requested a bride for Emperor Kael Dravonis. A political alliance to prevent war." He pulled out an official-looking document with the imperial seal. "I've generously offered you."
The Undying Tyrant. The Cursed Emperor. The man who'd had seventeen brides, all of whom had died within weeks under mysterious circumstances.
My father was sending me to my death.
"You can't," I whispered.
"I can, and I have. You leave in three days." He turned to go, then paused. "Oh, and Seraphina? Try to last at least a month. It would be embarrassing if you died too quickly."
The door closed.
I sat there in the darkness, numb with shock, until a new sound made me look up.
Someone was crying.
But it wasn't me.
The sound came from outside my window—a child's sobbing, desperate and afraid. I stumbled to the window and looked out into the dark garden.
A little girl in a servant's dress huddled under a tree, her face buried in her hands. She couldn't have been more than seven years old.
Then I saw him.
A man in a dark cloak stood in the shadows, watching her. I couldn't see his face, but something about the way he stood made my blood turn to ice.
The girl hadn't noticed him yet.
My door was locked from the outside. My father had made sure I couldn't leave.
The man in the garden took a step toward the crying child.
And I realized with horrible certainty that I was about to watch someone get hurt, and I couldn't do anything to stop it.